Governors including Gujarat Guv asked to step down:Report

Ahmedabad, 17 June, 2014

According to the Times of India report based on the sources in the government, the Union home secretary Anil Goswami called up six governors and suggested that they resign. Gujarat Governor Dr. Kamla Beniwal whose term is going to end later this year is one of them. M K Narayanan in West Bengal, Sheila Dikshit in Kerala, Margaret Alva in Rajasthan, K Sankaranarayanan in Maharashtra and Devendra Konwar in Tripura are the others.

The UPA government after coming to power in 2004 had removed BJP appointed Governors including Vishnukant Shastri (UP), Kailashpati Mishra (Gujarat), Babu Parmananad (Haryana) and Kedarnath Sahni (Goa).

The procedure as per the Supreme Court order allows the government to build a file containing the reasons for a governor’s removal prior to the council of ministers headed by the PM making such a recommendation to the President. Though the President can return the file, he must sign the recommendation in the event of Cabinet reiterating its decision.

ToI report quotes a senior govt official saying that the govt has enough reasons to seek their removal.

Author’s note: We don’t know much about other Governors, but present Gujarat Governor is blot on Raj Bhawan, not just due to controversial decisions like appointment of Lokayukta and blocking the bills passed by the state govt for obvious political reasons but more importantly due to a corruption case going on against her in Jaipur in connection with land scam.